I briefly mentioned about this in my Shin Godzilla review that there won't be any more live action Godzilla movies from TOHO until 2020. Recently, a post on Twitter referencing Nikkei Entertainment (a Japanese version of the Entertainment Weekly magazine) reconfirms that TOHO Co. will be making more Godzilla films after Godzilla vs Kong. Fans are excited about this piece of news because at least more movies are coming. Of course, I am excited about that as well, but not as much as everybody else because generally speaking, we already are getting at least one Godzilla movie a year. I am not here to be a pessimist though. I am here to give you news and share ideas. So what should we expect from TOHO after 2020? Well, let's take a look at what we can already speculate.
The movies will definitely be live action. From a Q&A with Shin Godzilla co-director, Shinji Higuchi, it was noted that there will not be any live action Godzilla films until after 2020 because of TOHO's contract with Legendary Pictures that restricts TOHO from making more live action Godzilla films. Despite being restricted from making any more live action films until after 2020, the contract didn't restrict TOHO from making a trilogy of animated Godzilla films to fill in the void while waiting for the contract to expire. This was confirmed when Higuchi was being asked about sequels for Shin Godzilla, which leads to my next speculation.
Shin Godzilla was a massive hit in Japan. What is there to stop TOHO from making a sequel to the 2016 film? There is so much they can work with that is left open for many potential ideas with one of the more popular ideas being more about the Godzilla humanoids shown at the end of the movie. Also, it was mentioned that the countdown clock to nuke Tokyo has only put on pause and when Godzilla wakes up again there will be an immediate thermonuclear strike on the monster and in the meantime, Japan will have to find a way to live side by side with Godzilla. I think that after 2020, TOHO's first plan is to make a follow up film to Shin Godzilla. Perhaps showing that Tokyo is still rebuilding and there is a rise in homeless citizens due to losing their homes from Godzilla's rampage, but the frozen Godzilla still lingers over the city. Scientists take skin samples and using Godzilla's DNA by applying it to other animals such as moths, plants, birds, etc. and it showed that the animals were able to adapt to extreme environments and also showed signs of aggression and random mutations occurring. People protest to have Godzilla removed, but the Japanese government find it way too difficult to even move the thing. In the meantime, they keep an eye on Godzilla to make sure there is no signs of him thawing to prevent Japan from being nuked. Also, there have been a rise of pets and people have gone missing. They find out that a Godzilla like humanoid creature was spotted in the sewers and was reported to Japanese officials, but nobody would believe that one of them is still alive after thorough tests on the ones on Godzilla's tail concluded that they were dead. Yet, Rando Yaguchi, who is now the new Prime Minister, reminds everybody how his theory about a giant creature sounded ridiculous until Godzilla came and not to be so ignorant on the possibilities that one of those creatures could still be alive. Just to take careful measures, the JSDF patrol the sewers for the creature. They find bones of dogs, cats, and people until they were attacked from behind. The cameras that were attached to the patrol squads captured a blurry image of the thing showing that it has grown bigger. Suddenly, a huge quake erupts from the ground showing the Godzilla spawn has grown half the size of Godzilla and marches towards the frozen god of destruction. As soon as it got near, the humanoid merges with Godzilla, which reawakens the slumbering giant and sheds his frozen dead skin for a more leaner body that is less resistant to artillery fire, but allowing him to move and attack much quicker than before. That is where I am going to stop before I get too far ahead of myself, but you get the idea of where I am going with it.
The biggest question of all is will TOHO Co continue using CGI or go back to suitmation? The answer to this question is totally up in the air. There are people that like CGI and there are people that like suitmation, so they will go with their preferred style of choice to speculate on. For me, I really liked how TOHO improved on CGI even if it did look floaty at times and I would prefer them to continue doing CGI over suitmation. If anything though, I would like to see TOHO mix both suitmation and CGI. Let's say that there are scenes that make CGI look awkward, they can reshoot it with a man in a suit so it doesn't look awkward and vice versa. There are times that suitmation does not work as well and they can replace the scene with suitmation with the same scene in CGI. For example look at Godzilla vs Megaguirus, there were a lot of horribly shot scenes where you can see the strings attached to the Megaguirus puppet. Wouldn't it have been better if those scenes were re-shot in CGI or at least cleaned up so the strings didn't appear and not look awkward as it did in the movie? That is my opinion anyways.
That is all I have for today. Do you think the next movie will be a sequel to Shin Godzilla or perhaps a new series all together? Do you prefer suitmation or CGI? Let me know in the comments what your thoughts and ideas are for future Godzilla movies. Make sure to bookmark or subscribe to my page to keep up to date on more Godzilla and other kaiju related news, reviews, and discussions.